Two deputies materialized from the side of the house, weapons drawn and aimed. Flashlight beams cut through the rain, pinning them like insects on display boards.
Alex wondered if prison jumpsuits came in his size or if he’d be swimming in orange polyester for the next five to ten years.
“On your knees! All of you!”
Alex’s legs turned to concrete, refusing to obey either the deputies or his own brain’s frantic escape commands. Wade moved first, slowly raising his hands and lowering to his knees. Bayne and Liam followed suit, their expressions carefully neutral.
“Down on the ground!” The deputy’s voice left no room for argument.
Alex finally managed to move, dropping to his knees in mud that soaked immediately through his jeans. Cold handcuffs clicked around his wrists, metal biting into skin.
“Got four of them.” The second deputy spoke into his radio. “Breaking and entering at the Crawford scene. Requesting transport.”
Crawford. Drew’s last name slammed into Alex like a physical blow. Until now, he’d almost managed to pretend this was all happening to someone else.
Wade caught Alex’s eye as he was cuffed, his expression communicating one clear message. Don’t panic.
Too late for that advice.
“This is private property and an active crime scene,” the first deputy recited as he secured Alex’s wrists behind his back. “You’re under arrest for criminal trespass and breaking and entering.”
Alex’s vision tunneled, darkness creeping in at the edges. Crime scene. His crime scene. The place where he’d killed Drew.
“Calling for additional transport,” the second deputy said into his radio. “Four male subjects in custody.”
They were loaded into separate cruisers once the second one arrived, Alex finding himself shoved into the back seat beside Wade, while Bayne and Liam were placed in another vehicle. The divider between front and back seats made Alex feel caged twice over, collar around his neck and now metal mesh inches from his face.
“They’ll run my prints,” he whispered, voice catching as panic squeezed his lungs. “They’ll connect me to Drew. They’ll know I killed him. They’ll—”
“Breathe,” Wade whispered back. “Just breathe, honey bunny. They don’t know anything yet. Right now we’re just trespassers.”
“Can’t,” he gasped, struggling against the handcuffs. “Can’t b-breathe.”
Wade shifted closer, somehow managing to press his shoulder against Alex’s despite their restraints. “Focus on my voice. In through your nose, out through your mouth. That’s it. Again.”
Alex fought to follow Wade’s instructions. Each breath came ragged and insufficient, like trying to suck air through a coffee stirrer.
Then his lungs refused to expand any further, his throat closing as if invisible hands were squeezing it shut until the cruiser, Wade, everything faded to a pinpoint of light in an ocean of darkness.
“Alex!” Wade’s voice seemed to come from miles away. “Stay with me!”
Darkness swallowed him whole.
Chapter Six
Yanking the cuffs apart like they were made of paperclips, Wade reached for Alex, who had slumped sideways against the vinyl like a ragdoll tossed off a shelf.
He pulled Alex into his arms, careful not to jostle him more than necessary. The guy weighed almost nothing, all bones and trembling panic, head lolling awkwardly against Wade’s shoulder. Blood, warm and just now soaking through Alex’s shirt, smeared onto Wade’s palm. So, not only were they arrested but his mate was leaking fluid and might need an ambulance.
Alex felt limp, dead weight pressed against Wade’s chest, rainwater and panic soaking through Wade’s shirt. Words stuck in his throat. If this was how the universe planned to hand-deliver his mate, it had a pretty fucked sense of humor.
“Stay with me, sweetheart,” he muttered, fingers stroking down Alex’s back. Tension bunched into a knot at the base of Wade’s skull. Not even a hint of movement from Alex, unless you counted the trickle of drool edging out the corner of his mouth.
Wade lifted his mate’s shirt to check his wound. Already it had stopped bleeding. It would heal. Thankfully he wouldn’t need a tetanus shot. His shifter DNA would make sure of that. Even though Alex couldn’t shift, he would heal. It would just take much longer.
There had to be a way to get that damn collar off of him. Wade would brainstorm with his pack. Twenty-one heads were better than one. Preston, Sasha and Jalen might be human, but Wade still counted all the mates as pack.
Outside the cruiser, the two deputies conferred under the streaming gutter, their flashlights throwing jittery shadows across the driveway. Wade recognized Roderick right away—the guy was built like a Malinois and had the bite to match. The second deputy, Griffin, looked like someone had misplaced his bake sale, a little too friendly for this kind of gig.
